Wonder
by souvenirs
Summary: Tess and Nate love each other and it's something they always wonder about.


**so this is probably my favourite thing i've written so far. it took me about two days and it just kinda flowed. and a little suggestion, seeing as most of this was inspired by it, listen to konstantine by something corporate. it's the most beautiful piece of writing ever.**

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Nate Black likes being at home. He hates parties. It's all loud European beats and too much alcohol. He hates the sweaty bodies being pushed up against each other and the smell of regret that lingers in the air long after closing time. So he doesn't go out and party, but sometimes when he's home alone at night he wonders where she is. The people she's meeting, the things she's doing, the mistakes she's making. He knows she's at a club, she always loved being the center of attention. She dances and sings and giggles. Her skirts are too short, her shirts are too tight and her heels are too high. He watches her go and she promises she'll be back, and she does come back. Whether it be the same night or in the early hours of the morning, stumbling into the room too loudly for her to be sober. She always comes back and that's something Nate never wonders about.

Tess Tyler hates cigarettes. It's an assumption people make, oh she must smoke. He's the one who smokes. Obsessively. There's an ash tray in almost every room in the house because she hates it when he get forgetful and leaves the burning butt on the table, leaving a black mark on the solid oak. But when he's gone on tour and she's alone in the huge house she talked him into buying, because they can't raise a family in a condo, she finds the pack he tries to hide from her when he promises her he'll quit. She light one and watch the end burn, watch it flicker and fade. She'll take a deep breath and it smells like him. She'll take a long drag and it'll taste like him. She let the smoke fill her mouth and curl into her lungs and it's like she's breathing in him. She wonders if he knows she smokes them. When he comes back the pack is either half done or completely gone, replaced by a new pack. She wonders if he knows how pathetic she feels when she's sitting in their over sized house with a cigarette dangling dangerously from her mouth. She feels like one of those girls you see on those shitty day time talk shows who cut themselves because their boyfriend's left them. But she knows he'll be back. He always comes back and that's something Tess never wonders about.

Nate loves music. He loves it so fucking much he's not sure what he would do without it. And sometimes when he's on the road and she can't be there because, really, she's too young to be trapped in a tour bus, moving from city to city, he gets angry at Shane and Jason and how they don't take anything seriously. Because that's what he is, serious. Shane has his girls and drugs, because life is short and you gotta take what they give you. Jason has his birds and childish fantasies, because life is short and sometimes you just need to see the little things. But he doesn't care about that. He cares about his music and sometimes he thinks he cares about her. So he'll lie in his bunk at night, the rocking of the bus lulling him to sleep, wondering about her and whether she knows how much he misses her right now. Absence makes the heart grow fonder and maybe it's the distance that makes him forget about the stuff that they do to each other. They hurt each other in too many different ways and it's sick and it makes his stomach twist but he writes his best songs after they fight. He needs her and that's something Nate never wonders about.

Tess Tyler is terrified of being old. It's a vain fear and she knows it and she lets people thinks she's obscenely afraid of wrinkles. Really, she's so fucking scared of things changing. Really, deep down in her core, she's a control freak. Change does not bode well with her. She likes order and organization and perfection. It's in her blood really. So she lies in bed, the nights she's not out because she needs her beauty sleep, and wonders what the hell is going to happen tomorrow, next week, next year. Can this last, can she really have a functioning relationship. But it's not functioning really. It's more out of the fact that really no one else would put up with her or even him. She needs him and that's something Tess never wonders about.

Nate loves kids. He wants to have a boat load of them. His therapist tells him, because being a heart throb at age fifteen gives you a complex, his longing for a huge family comes from his feeling of abandonment. When your dad leaves you for some pretty young thing when you're ten, you're destined to be screwed up. So he tells her his dream is to be the dad that his never was. He wants to love something unconditionally and maybe prove to himself he isn't his father. He wants to love and care for them. He wants to teach them how to play guitar or the piano, he wants to be everything his dad wasn't. So when he's nineteen and she tells him that she's pregnant, he reacts a little different and ignores the maybe part cause all he can see is a white picket fence and soccer games. He tells her that they'll finally get a place together and they'll get married and they'll do this right. When she calls the next day to tell him that in fact, she is not pregnant all he can see is her lies and her desperation. He yells and says somethings that maybe he'll regret. He wonders how she could do this. How she could throw that one thing in his face. But he knows she's a manipulative bitch and it's something Nate never wonders about.

Tess hates liars. She hated the illusion and the leading on part. The whole scam that was a lie. That's why she hated Mitchie, that's why she hated her dad, that's why she hated herself. Lies were fickle things. You could never keep up with them. That's why Tess hated them. They changed things, made them less real. But there was once when she wished he would have lied. Really, she wished she had employed the don't ask, don't tell policy. She always kept her phone on, but this time was different. He was mad at her, normally she would be the one who started a fight. It would be a simple thing, thrown out of proportion because she was always a drama queen. This time it was him, all him. Their fights are normally predictable. She kicks and hits and scratches, leaving her mark on him. He yells and screams and belittles, leaving his mark too. They break each other in different ways but leave one another hurt all the same. They make up, it's a matter of time. Usually involves fragrant flowers and mumbled apologies. This time it's a melt down and then silence. To Tess, who's grown accustomed to the screaming and yelling, the silence is worst. She sits in her room, smoking cigarettes and watching reruns when her phone rings. She normally would pick it up but this isn't normal. It's bitter and harsh and just thinking about it makes her head spin. But curiosity killed the cat and she picks up her phone and listens to her voice mail. He tells her they're even, he slept with someone else, he hates her. She doesn't wait to listen to the rest of the message before the phone is flung across the room. Collateral damage in their train wreck of a relationship. She wonders how he could do this to her. Contrary to popular belief she's only ever been with him. Really, their only real relationship has been with each other. Destined to be each other's first and lasts. But this wasn't in the deal, an unspoken pact between them. She wonders how she could ever trust him, ever love him. But she knows he's self loathing and needy and it's something Tess never wonders about.

Nate loves hospitals. It's a bad thing, he knows. He loves the smell of the bleach and disinfectant. He loves the clean white in the empty rooms. He loves the excitement of people rushing around, knowing that something is really at stake here. Really, he's only been to the hospital if Jason has fallen off the stage or if Shane gets a throat infection. People have asked for autographs and he obliges because if they're at the hospital then they need a little happiness. But this time there's no autographs or excitement because it's her life at her life at stake here. He mumbles her name to the nurse before she guides him to her room. She's pale, more so than she normally is. Her hair is rumpled and her wrists are bandaged. Her thin frame looks so fragile in the room, filled with machines and flowers. She's been here two days but he's been in a daze that it doesn't even register with him until he hears it from Caitlyn. She looks at the wall, never at him. The silence threatens to engulf them both before he speaks. It's a murmured apology. She scoffs and whispers a lyric. 'For you I'd bleed myself dry.' He wonders why she did this. A stab of guilt hits him in his chest and he feels like the wind got knocked out of him. He would die without her and it's something Nate never wonders about.

Tess hates being alone. She loves being with people. They make her feel alive. It's really him leaving her that pushes her over the edge. The therapist tells her that she's always been depressed, it just took a trigger to set her off. She wants to tell him that, when he comes to visit her. But she was never good with words, that was always his thing. She is always the more physical one of the two. So whereas he may have told her that she made him want to kill himself or that he would rather die than do whatever it was she wanted him to do, it would be her that actually tried. So she sits in the white hospital room, he stands there awkwardly, mumbling excuses. She wants to tell him to leave but she's so scared that if she does he'll never come back and next time no one is going to find her. She wonders whether this all worth it. It being the cycle of fighting and making up, hurting each other and then forgiving each other without a second thought. It's messed up and dysfunctional but she needs it. Being alone is not an option. She would die, or at least try to, without him, and it's something that Tess never wonders about.

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**so i realize that this is a very bad ending but endings have never been my strong suit. whatever, if you're gonna favourite at least leave me a short review. i'm not even asking for a novel of a review. they make me happy. thanks (:**

**--dorothy  
**


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